The Portland daily press., 1887-10-01
THE CRIMSON SCARF.
New York Times.l

at thoughtful intervals. The war was by
twenty-five years thing of the past, but as
head of a great commercial enterprise a
military title still chung to him from out of
his war experience, and he did not dislike it,
for some of his war memories appeared to
be his most cherished mental treasures. So
he debated with his cigar over the two
young people whose sentimental rashness
had brought them into public notice, and as
he debated he was looking backward over
the diverse panorama of two decades of life,
through the rifted smoke clouds of great
rebellion at little drama that seemed al
most dream. but which to him was, per-
haps, the best-remembered incident of all
the five years fight. And when he told it,
half musingly, the listeners did not wonder
The ways of fate are very diverse, and it
sometimes happens to the least imaginative
In the maddening crowd that face which is
looked into only for moment is never for
gotten in all the length of the years that fol-
low Perhaps it was so with the COM
mander-in-chief. Perhaps not. In any event
nobody dared to ask.
''In the fall of 1861 he began, 81 was sta
TONED with detachment at Paint Rock,
Ala. We were drawing on the enemy for
supplies; foraging, in fact, Our crackers
and hard tack we got from Stevenson, but
for fodder for our horses, and anything to
add sumptuous to the appearance Of the
frying-pan we had to depend on the country.
For some weeks / had sent out the wagon
train to the east, the southeast, and down
the valley of the Paint Rock creek. The
only direction left for investigation was the
west, where, at distance of q miles, was
Huntsville, then the capital of northern Ala
bama, which, up to the time of the war, had
been wealthy, aristocratic and fashionable
city. Well, one pleasant morning l sent the
wagons across the creek and followed them
with guard of twenty men. 1t was report
ed from time to time that the country ahead
of US was full of rebel guerrillas, but we saw
no signs of them, and for two months had no
trouble whatever with any foe.
After crossing the creek the wagons took
road which wound along the foot of spur
at the Blue Ridge mountains, which rose
green, heavily wooded, and picturesque at
our backs. We passed several small clear
ings and plantations, whose log houses were
filed with hot-blooded and hot-tempered
Southerni women, whose evident desire to
fay us with their fingernails rather inter-
fered with that spirit of hospitality for
which the South is famous. At distance
of seven miles halted the detachment at a
cool, but sinister-looking place in the road,
known to all the country round about as the
Cap
"'The Gap was the entrance to pass
through one of the outlying mountain spurs
1t was a deep hollow, heavily wooded.
The dense growth of towering pines and frs
grew close to the roadside. The woody
spaces were SO filed with underground and
blocked by fallen trees that as you peered
into the dark recesses of the forest on either
side hostile army might have been shell
tered there without your being able to per-
ceive button. l remember the looks of
the place because the first time saw it it
made me rather uneasy, and the last time
but one that l saw it / came near staying
there for good, as did, in fact, some other
poor fellows who were net so fortunate.
swell, after a rest, we kept on, and few
miles further we came on plantation of
$50 acres, with large and comfortable look
ing residence near the roadside. The wag-
Gus had reached there long before us. They
were being rapidly filed from row of well
stored corncribs at the back of the house.
had just gotten off my horse near the door
when two girls came toward me-and if 1
were not telling this story, gentlemen,
would honestly declare that they were the
two prettiest girls ever saw in my life.
"They were both tall and slender, with
graceful and womanly figures. They were
dressed in dark blue calico, and had no arti-
fetal aids to their fresh young beauty.
Their faces were intelligent and full of res
olution, yet marked by that shyness which
belongs to girls who are we'll born and bred
in comparative seclusion. The elder Ellen,
was dark-eyed and dark-haired. Addie was
II, two years younger than her sister, and
yellow-haired and blue-eyed blonde. The
apparition they presented us. /
think all the men tookloff their hats instinc-
lively. know did. And as my hat was a
real Mexican sombrero. and matched the
long Mexican spurs that jingled on my heels,
l was rather fond of keeping it on my
head.
ut was Ellen who spoke, the other staying
aIlittle behind. Sir she said in troubled
voice, you look like a gentleman One of
your men has taken our guitar 1t is all that
we have left, and it is a great consolation.
Will you not be good enough to have it re-
turned?'
1.-THE guitar was returned to her forth
with as quickly as the man could be found
Jhn had ~ ShA I'll !.
and the light in the younger sisters eyes at
the salvation Of the instrument indicated
how highly 1t was valued. The corn and
supplies they did not appear to grieve over
particularly, as prevented any destruction
Of the cribs or any unnecessary damage to
the property. Consequently was very hos
pitably received in the house. The family
consisted Of an old gentleman named Sun
dsrland. his wife and three daughters. Sun
derland was well-to-do planter, though
not too old to take arms. He was doctor
by profession and Methodist preacher by
choice. His family circle was, in its refine
ment and the beauty of the girls, something
charming, particularly to a horse soldier
who for some years had known only the
roughness Of the camp. The eldest daughter
was married, her husband being a captain
In the rebel army, The other two were our
fair petitioners, and with them / enjoyed a
fiattering degree of popularity from the
start"
The commander-in-chief stopped and gazed
with satisfied smile into the Alabama of
twenty years ago.
"Well," he said, picking up the thread of
the story, II need only say their fate was in
my hands. that all is fair in love and war,
and that from that day forth / simply owned
the place, corn fields, niggers, guitar and
Methodist preachers, all included. And gen.
tlemen-" and he dwelt with some particu-
lar and meaning emphasis upon the 'and"
"she, Ellen, was 10 and / was %.
During the next two months all our for
aging somehow was in their direction. 1t
seemed perhaps to the horses that every
thing available in the food line had migrated
to the district back of the Sunderland plan
tation. which had to be passed in order to
light on anything at ALL There was some
thing about the Sunderland cuisine, too,
that must have appeared very tempting to
my men, for / did not willingly believe,
miss a meal. Ellen and |, in fact, were con-
stantly together The old folks made no OBJ
lection. The blue eyes Of the golden-haired
.;.@or l4aoo,od tba s,x,aafoe% Lind g ,,,,.a,a1